A truly perfect Vanilla Cupcake recipe! These Vanilla Cupcakes are easy to make, moist, and bake up beautifully every time! Light, fluffy and flavorful! Got the baking bug? Try my Lemon Cupcakes and Chocolate Cupcakes too!
Perfect Vanilla Cupcakes Recipe
This week I’ve made 6 batches of vanilla cupcakes and a vanilla cake. I feel like my oven has been on for 42 hours straight! =) What are all these cupcakes for, you might ask. Well, for me… and for science, and for you too. Confused yet? I’ll explain…
I have been on a search for a perfect vanilla cupcake recipe for several years. I have tried Martha’s, Magnolia’s, Billy’s and Amy Sedaris’. I’ve read the Cake Bible from cover to cover (really!). I’ve googled until I can’t google anymore! Some of the recipes were good, just not perfect. I’ve considered just giving up… maybe my expectations were to high. I wanted a vanilla cupcake recipe that was as light and fluffy as a box mix, but without all the funny chemicals. I wanted a cupcake that was flavorful and moist. And I wanted it to be almost as easy to make from scratch as from a box.
The BEST Vanilla Cupcakes
This week, I wasn’t going to stop until I found what I was looking for. So I baked and baked… then went to the store for more butter and sugar, and baked some more! I tried recipes with butter, oil, or some of both… recipes with milk, buttermilk, or sour cream… 1 egg, 2 eggs, 5 eggs… baking powder, baking soda… bake at 350*, bake at 325*…
I made cupcakes that were lopsided, over-flowing, over-baked, and just plain ugly…
And then I made these…
They looked beautiful and tasted perfect, so I double checked all my notes to make sure I could remember what I put in them… then I made another batch to make sure it was THE ONE.
They were just as perfect!! I think I heard angels singing….
I am SO happy to share the results of my many experiments! These cupcakes were absolutely delicious and I look forward to making them again and again. Now certainly, peoples tastes and preferences vary greatly. I love these, my husband (my #1 taste tester) loves them, and I hope many of you will too. As with any recipe, it is very important to use the best quality ingredients you can.
Ingredients Needed
You will notice the recipe calls for cake flour, which is a bit more expensive than all-purpose flour, but I have found it is essential to produce the light and fluffy texture I was looking for. Also, the recipe uses oil instead of butter. I realized most cupcake recipes (from scratch) call for butter, and yet box mixes (which have the texture I was looking for) are baked using oil.
I was concerned that using only oil would leave the cupcakes without adequate flavor, but I found that with good quality vanilla, these cupcakes are delicious and flavorful.
- 1 1/4 cups cake flour
- 3/4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup oil (vegetable, canola or extra light olive oil)
- 1/3 cup milk (whole or low fat, but avoid fat free)
- 1/3 cup sour cream (full fat or light, but avoid fat free)
How To Make Vanilla Cupcakes
- Preheat oven to 350*F.
- In a medium bowl, add cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir together with whisk, and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, add eggs and beat 10-20 seconds. Add sugar and continue to beat on medium speed about 30 seconds. Add vanilla and oil, beat.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add about half of the flour mixture. Add the milk, then the rest of the flour and the sour cream. Beat until just combined. Scrap down the side of the bowl.
- The batter will be thin. Pour batter into a muffin pan prepared with paper liners. Fill liners about 2/3 full.
- Bake cupcakes in pre-heated oven for 12-14 minutes.
- Cool in pan 1-2 minutes, then remove cupcakes from pan (carefully) and finish cooling on a wire rack.
- Frost as desired when fully cool. I love to use my favorite Vanilla Cream Cheese Frosting recipe.
- Feel free to use this recipe for a cake as well. The recipe above will work for a 6″ cake. Double the recipe for an 8″ or 9″ cake.
* A note about Cake Flour- Cake Flour has a lower protein content than traditional all-purpose flour, which results in a more tender, delicate crumb in the finished product. If you can not find or access cake flour, feel free to substitute as necessary, but your results will vary from the original recipe.
RECIPE UPDATES
I have made this recipe many times with success, but in an effort to always be improving (even great recipes) I’ve made a couple small updates to this recipe (which are now listed in the recipe card).
My original recipe included 1 1/4 tsp. baking powder (now reduced to 3/4), 3/4 cup sugar (now increased to 1 cup) and 1/2 cup buttermilk (now updated to 1/3 cup milk, 1/3 cup sour cream).
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More Cupcake Recipes
How To Make Vanilla Cupcakes
Perfect Vanilla Cupcakes
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 cups cake flour
- 3/4 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 1/2 cup oil vegetable, canola or extra light olive oil
- 1/3 cup milk whole or low fat, but avoid fat free
- 1/3 cup sour cream full fat or light, but avoid fat free
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350*F.
- In a medium bowl, add cake flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir together with whisk, and set aside.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, add eggs and beat 10-20 seconds. Add sugar and continue to beat on medium speed about 30 seconds. Add vanilla and oil, beat.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add about half of the flour mixture. Add the milk, then the rest of the flour and the sour cream. Beat until just combined. Scrap down the side of the bowl.
- The batter will be thin. Pour batter into a muffin pan prepared with paper liners. Fill liners about 2/3 full.
- Bake cupcakes in pre-heated oven for 12-14 minutes.
- Cool in pan 1-2 minutes, then remove cupcakes from pan (carefully) and finish cooling on a wire rack.
- Frost as desired when fully cool. I love to use my favorite cream cheese frosting or buttercream frosting with these cupcakes.
I made these today for my son’s birthday party and they are so delicious! This will be my go to recipe for vanilla cake/cupcakes from now on, thank you! I doubled the recipe and got 27 cupcakes.
I use cake flour all the time and my question is can you substitute High Ratio Cake Flour in this Vanilla cupcake recipe?
I have not ever experimented with high ratio cake flour, but I think it would be worth a try. From my limited reading on high ratio cake flour, you may want to be sure not to overfill the cups, or they may overflow quite a bit. But it sounds like you may be more familiar with it than me, so I say, go for it! =)
Is it okay if I will use All-purpose flour instead of cake flour? Thanks Glory and I can’t wait to try this recipe.
Hi Anica,
Cake flour usually produces a finer texture, but feel free to experiment as you wish.
Hi – Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe. I have made these cupcakes a few times now and they are delicious and my go-to recipe.
I wanted to ask is it possible to make them the day before they are required. I have a birthday boy and we take cakes into class. So I was thinking I could bake them today put them in a container and putting your lovely cream cheese frosting on them at some point. I have to make approx. 25 so I don’t want to be doing it all in the morning prior to school. Do you have any hints or tips for this situation? If you do I would be very grateful for your advice, Many thanks have a wonderful day. Leanne
would these be ok filled with dulce de deche (sp??) . Or would one of your other cupcakes be better? Just not chocolate…….thank you
I just saw that my msg was addressed to Gloria while i meant Glory…:)
Hi Deepa, No worries, if you’re leaving a nice comment you can call me whatever you want! =) But yes, my name is just Glory.
You can make the cakes one day in advance with no problems. Just keep the cakes loosely covered and at room temperature. I would not suggest baking them more than a day in advance. Happy baking!
Hi Gloria,
I have to say just like many of the other reviewers,these cupcakes were the best!!!..Made them for my girl’s 2nd b”day they turned out amazing!!..Everybody loved it.!!!
I do have a question though,Can i make these in advance.??..like a day before and can i leave it at room temp.??.Last time i made them the same day and used it..Thanks in advance!!
My search is over! This was a moist and light vanilla cake! I loved the texture. I thought it would taste tangy because of the buttermilk but it did not. Thank you for the excellent recipe. I live at 5300 ft. I did add an extra 1T of cake flour and reduced the baking powder to 1 tsp and baking soda down to 1/4 tsp. The cake was too salty so next time I will decrease the salt to 1/4 tsp.
Hello Glory I’m in Scotland and making cupcakes for my nephews wedding on Saturday. I tried your recipe an hour ago, using Andy Pages conversion to grams , but using half the amount of baking powder and soda, as I was using self raising flour (we don’t have cake flour or corn starch) and I am delighted with the result! Yummy Fluffy cupcakes. Thankyou so much!! I have a wee facebook page where you can check out my cakes – Sugartum Fairy.
I was so hopeful that these would be perfect. The batter was gorgeous. They did not fall. They were slightly underbaked to prevent dryness. They look perfect. The taste and texture is another story. They were very bland, dry, and blah. It is almost as if they had too many large air bubbles in the batter. I may try it again adjusting a few things as the batter in general has potential.